Swan River Botany.
Many of our friends, as well as ourselves, have felt great anxiety respecting the fate of those valuable collections of plants and seeds, which it was at length ascertained had been embarked by Mr. Drummond, at the Swan River, in the month of May last, on board the "Shepherd," bound for London. On application to the gentlemen, Messrs. Sewel, Norman and Sewel, to whom this vessel is consigned, they assure us that news has been received of her arrival in China, where she had to take in a cargo, and whence she would proceed direct to England. In the meanwhile, we are sure our readers will peruse with interest the following extracts from letters which have lately come from Mr. Drummond, much in them bearing on those plants which will be found in the collections now daily expected.
Perth, Western Australia,
May 10th, 1842.
"I have just shipped, on board the 'Shepherd,' bound for London, two large boxes, containing about 15,000 dried specimens of Swan River, and sent some account of them in two long letters, which I despatched about a fortnight since.[1] There are collections of native seeds in these boxes, destined for the Royal Gardens at Kew, and for Baron Hugel. In gathering these seeds, I have aimed to procure chiefly those of ornamental shrubs and plants, which you will see by the dried specimens which accompany them, as the fine Banksias, Dryandras, Verticordias of this country. Among the seeds are some papers containing roots of mixed sorts of Droseras, which, from the state in which they now are, I perceive would have vegetated successfully if I had had the opportunity of shipping them direct for London four months ago, as several are now in flower, though they have lain in dry sand for the last half year. The specific name of bulbosa is
- ↑ See [[../../Volume 1|vol. 1]] of this [[../../|Journal]], p. 626.
